1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to movable mandible articulator. More particularly it relates to a dental articulator capable of completely and faithfully reproducing movements of a mandibular cast and maxillary cast used for completely reproducing the human jaw movement, especially articulation in producing dental prosthesis for defective or missing teeth. Still more particularly it relates to a very simple and innovative movable mandibular articulator that duplicates the mandibular movement of the human jaw. The articulator or the present invention allows easy visualization of the mandibular movements and duplicates them by reproducing the same movements and not their mirror images. The articulator is a very versatile articulator which enables development of accurate dental occlusion. It can be utilized as an ideal education tool for explaining occlusion in dental schools as well as be utilized by the most versatile laboratories to make dental crowns, partial fixed dentures; removable dentures implant prostheses maxillofacial prostheses, and orthognathic surgical casts.
2. Description of Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 CFR 1.97 and 37 CFR 1.98
The movable mandible articulator is a very simple and innovative articulator that duplicates the mandibular movement of the human jaw. It allows easy visualization of the mandibular movements and duplicates them by reproducing the same movements and not their mirror images. It is a very versatile articulator which will allows the development of accurate dental occlusion. It can be utilized as an ideal education tool for explaining occlusion in dental schools as well as be utilized by the most versatile laboratories to make dental crowns, partial fixed dentures, removable dentures and implant prostheses.
Reproduction of all mandibular movements is indispensable to production of dental prosthesis for enabling good mastication and maintaining stability of the stomatognathic system. Interocclusal movement shows highly noticeable differences among individuals. It is therefore desirable to have a dental articulator capable of completely reproducing the mandibular movements of the jaw of each individual.
A variety of dental articulators has been devised so far for this purpose. The different types of articulators such as ancient hinge type to nonarcon type to state of the art arcon type of articulators have always attempted to mimic the anatomy and movement of the mandible as closely as possible to what is effected by the human body.
In the human body, the mandible terminates at either end in a ball like condylar head which is attached to a housing called the glenoid fossa by way of muscles and ligaments which allow the movement of the mandible in all six directions i.e. protrusive, retrusive, left lateral, right lateral, vertical up and vertical down movements. The temporomandibular joint condylar ball (element) is attached to the mandible and the condylar housing is attached to the skull (maxillary part).
In the non arcon articulators the condylar head (element) is attached to the maxilla i.e. the upper member of the articulator and the condylar housing was attached to the mandible i.e. the lower member.
In the arcon articulators, the condylar element is attached to the mandibular member (lower member or base) and the condylar housing is attached to the upper member (maxillary member) thus in a static position it duplicated the human jaw. The various types of arcon articulators include                1) fully adjustable articulators        2) semi-adjustable articulators        3) set condylar path articulators        4) combination (set condylar path or fully adjustable) articulators        
But in all these articulators mandibular movement in the mouth is simulated by movement of the maxillary member in the articulator i.e. mandibular movement to the left side is simulated by movement of maxillary member to the right side. In dentistry, the front side and plane in a general sense are expressed in terms of “frontal plane”, “sagittal plane” and “occlusal plane” respectively. In general, the side towards which mandibular movement is directed is termed the ‘working side’ and the opposite side is termed the ‘balancing or non-working side’ of the maxilla and mandible which constitute the jaw. The mandible is movable and restrained in movement via configuration of the glenoid fossa accommodating right and left “condyle heads”. The mandible can move in six protrusive, retrusive, left lateral, right lateral, vertical up and vertical down movements. A center of a condylar head is termed as “condylar point” and a line connecting the centers of right and left condyle heads is termed as “condylar axis” and locus along which the condylar point moves along the glenoid fossa is termed as the “condylar path”.
Jaw movements to be reproduced are fulfilled by the mandibular movement made in the five directions as thought above. However conventional articulators cannot perform all the five directional mandibular movements. For reproducing the jaw movement i.e. movement of the condylar points in the protrusive, leftward and rightward directions will suffice. With respect to the lateral movements of the jaws, when the mandible moves rightward the right condyle head works as the working side and the left condyle head works as the balancing side. The reverse is also true when the mandible moves leftwards. Thus the jaw movement to be reproduced must vary according to the movement of each condylar head which is performed in a different manner in moving the mandible right or leftward.
However, all existing articulators, even the fully adjustable ones, simulate this mandibular movement by movement of maxillary member to the opposite side.